When word spread that Jim and Rita Sands were reopening Zoe’s in the former Butternuts space in Hadley, people were excited. Zoe’s Fish and Chop House in Easthampton had ended its 13-year run in 2003, done in by high energy costs and shrinking margins. The site today is home to a medical center. For many people, Zoe’s was the place to go for fish in this area. Its salad bar was the stuff of legend.
“Zoe’s was intended as a middle-of-the-road dinner place,” Jim Sands explained to me. “I couldn’t raise my prices.” His new place, ZOE’S FISH HOUSE (195 Russell St., Hadley, 387-0700) aims for the same kind of diners. It is not a temple of haute cuisine. Rather, it is a place where the owners care about serving good and mostly local seafood. The salad bar, unfortunately or not, has not followed Sands to Hadley. In its place is a plate of olive and artichoke salad, lightly dressed with lemon juice and olive oil, that arrives as a complimentary touch before each dinner.
I have yet to try the meats at Zoe’s because of the allure of the seafood. On one occasion, my wife had the steamed mussels appetizer as a dinner portion ($8.95), a large plate of fat, Maine mussels. I had a half dozen littleneck clams ($7.95) as a starter. My father and I loved clams and we used to add horseradish and Worcestershire sauce to cocktail sauce for a spicy condiment. You can get a cocktail sauce and horseradish with your raw shellfish at Zoe’s, but better yet is the mignonette sauce that also accompanies them. A simple combo of red wine vinegar, shallots and peppercorns, it accentuates the taste of the shellfish without obscuring it. Another night, my dinner companion and I had a tasting of a half dozen oysters ($10.95), three different types, with the selection changing according to what’s available in the market that day. Again, the mignonette sauce served as a complement rather than a mask.
The chief criticism I’ve heard of Zoe’s food is that “it’s a simple plate of fish and vegetables and potatoes. Nothing fancy.” But in a way, the mignonette sauce – a small, special touch in the midst of the familiar – typifies Zoe’s approach.
Jim Sands spent 10 years as executive chef for a restaurant group in Southern California, and his duties included buying the fresh fish for all the restaurants. At Zoe’s in Easthampton, getting good quality, interesting fish was a priority for him, even though it increased his expenses.
Certainly the blackened Scottish salmon ($21.95) I had one night at the new Zoe’s exemplifies that approach. Rich and meaty, it was farm raised organically in Scotland and it was the best piece of salmon I’ve had since my last trip to Seattle. The accompanying yellow squash and zucchini were al dente and the au gratin potatoes were rich with Cheddar cheese. My friend Betsy’s pasta was a frutti di mare mélange of mussels, clams, scallops, shrimp and calamari ($19.95), all obviously fresh, served with properly cooked pasta and a tomato sauce that was oddly sweet. Sands was surprised when I mentioned the sauce to him, and said he’d have his sous chefs make him a batch to see why it was so sweet.
Among the appetizers, Zoe’s clam chowder is nicely done – a creamy blend, not too thick, of potatoes and clams with a touch of rosemary. A Manhattan-style fish chowder has the right notes of tomatoes, celery, potatoes, black pepper and fish. Fried Tuscan-style calamari ($7.50) is crisp and accompanied by sliced hot cherry peppers, olives, capers and chopped garlic. It could have done without the mayonnaise base, but the rest was quite good.
Manhattan chowder? Cherry peppers? Yes, Jim Sands is a child of the Middle Atlantic states, growing up in New Jersey, where Manhattan-style chowder prevails, and pickled cherry peppers are readily available and used often. After graduating from the Culinary Institute of America, he managed his grandfather’s French restaurant in New Jersey for five years before striking out for California.
There he connected with a restaurant group, working first in its Long Beach steakhouse, then opening Ocean City Seafood in Santa Monica for the company. The place had a large raw bar and offered a plat de fruits de mare that Sands set about stocking with as many types of shellfish as he could find. After Rita Sands became homesick for the East Coast, they resettled, first in the Raleigh-Durham area of North Carolina, and then, after meeting the owner of the former Vermont Country Deli, in Greenfield. When a position with the deli operation fell through, Sands found he missed working with fresh seafood, and Zoe’s Fish and Chop House in Easthampton was born.
“Why Zoe’s?” I asked him. “Who is Zoe?” Turns out that while naming sessions were under way, a server had a baby whom she named Zoe, which means life and vitality in Greek.
Sands tries to buy as much of his seafood locally as he can, although Zoe’s western Massachusetts home stretches the 100-mile radius required by strict locavores. The frying clams are from Ipswich, the oysters are also from Massachusetts, the cod, haddock and scallops are from Georges Bank, and the mussels are from Maine. He gets some shrimp from the Gulf area, and says the recent oil spill has caused a spike in the price suppliers are asking.
Zoe’s is open for dinner seven nights a week, and for lunch Monday through Friday. The restaurant is currently donating $1 of every dinner served Monday through Wednesday to the Gulf Seafood Relief Fund.
Originally printed Daily Hampshire Gazette, June 18, 2010
